After such an exciting qualifying, the Grand Prix had a lot to live up to, and it didn't let us down. There was the threat of rain, plenty of different strategies, and pit stop blunders galore.
The Race
Webber had a stunning race, despite being hit with a drive through penalty mid-way through. The Red Bull and Brawn battle was in full swing, despite other players getting in the way.
Team by Team
With Ferrari getting on the podium, they had a pretty good day, but many others are just trying to keep looking on the bright side, including Toyota, and Force India.
Brawn lead Red Bull at the top of the table, whilst Toyota lead Ferrari by just 2.5 points. Further back, McLaren and Renault are split just by 1 point.
This week we discuss the merits of a potential new FIA president, talk about Rubens' rant at his team, and wonder why it took Webber so long. Plus, voicemails from Goodwood, and a Fantasy Racers update.
Intro
It's all blah, blah, blah, blah. I want to get on my plane and go home.
Good Week / Bad Week
It's been a good week for Spanish fans and race fans in general, as Alonso is going to Oviedo, but won't be going to Fuji anymore. It's been a bad week for Force India and their motorhome, plus that weird rollercoaster at the Nurburgring.
News and Views
The FIA could be in trouble about how they chose the teams for next year, but it's okay because the saviour of the FIA Mr Vatanen is definitely standing for the presidency in October.
The Race
We talk more about qualifying than the race itself, as all kind of good things happened during the early sessions of the weekend. However, as usual, it was a tale of two teams with Brawn going head to head with Red Bull, and Webber coming out on top.
Fantasy Racers
There are lots of great team reports still coming in from Fantasy Racers players around the globe. We also discover that Mr C is falling backwards the more he tries.
Feedback
A few emails covering International Sidepodmeetups, the state of driver choices for USF1 plus a new voice in the press conference. We also hear some excited people at Goodwood.
Housekeeping
There's a quick update on our Sidepodscience experiment - it's not going well, and we decide what to do next week.
All our rehearsing worked out well for the Parade Lap this morning, so now it's time to see what effect it will have on the debrief. We've got an excellent race weekend to discuss, plus much, much more.
It's been a few weeks since we've done a debrief, so there's news to catch up on, plus a Fantasy Racers update and all your feedback.
It's already gone 6pm, so that deadline is out the window, but we'll be live very shortly. Hopefully see you in the comments.
Ah-ha, the race. We've been waiting for a good few weeks for some racing, and after qualifying was unbelievably chaotic and awesome, this Grand Prix has a lot to look up to.
Weather Update
So far it looks like there have been on and off showers, and things are pretty wet. There's no sign of the downpour we had two years ago, but the weather could play a part today.
One to Watch
Although Webber is on pole, all eyes should be on Vettel. As Button's main contender for the championship, the battle off the start line will be crucial. Vettel has been known to sit behind cars for the duration, so it could be over for him by the first corner.
Predictions Please
Can Webber convert his first pole position to his first win? Will Vettel be able to get past the Brawns and make his mark on the race? What can Glock do from the back? Will we see a Safety Car at all today?
All those rehearsals we've been doing should take effect now, in the first Parade Lap in our new setup. We're joined by Alex who will hopefully keep things running smoothly whilst we panic about everything we've broken in trying to make it better.
Nevertheless, the Parade Lap is always a lot of fun, music, chatter, games and laughter, with the occasional mention of all things F1.
We'll be going live at 11:10 BST, so make sure you're in the live comments, as you'll likely get a mention on the show. See you there!
The wet weather continued at the Nurburgring to cause complete chaos in qualifying that saw the other Renault and a Force India into the third session of qualifying. All was normal right at the front though.
Free Practice 3
Barrichello was the man with all the work to do as he was kept in his garage for half a session, but once again it was McLaren who had things under control.
Qualifying
The rain came down and interrupted pretty much every session of qualifying, with Glock out in the first, and Piquet and Sutil getting through to the last.
Team By Team
Both McLaren, Force India and Red Bull are pretty ecstatic with how their day went, considering there was an upturn in fortune for all of them. Toyota, BMW and Toro Rosso still continue to scratch their heads and ponder what is going wrong.
Free Practice was wet, which would normally see a lack of running, but instead we got to see some very interesting proceedings. Listen on to find out what happened during the sessions and all the following reactions.
Free Practice 1
It started, and then it rained, which is about right for the Nurburgring. The natural order of things was slightly messed up but it wasn't long before Red Bull staked their claim.
Free Practice 2
Now things got even more confusing, with more rain to add to the mix, plus some fast Force Indias and McLarens. In fact, Lewis was the fastest man out there at the end of the day.
Team by Team
Bourdais has a list of problems he suffered with his car today, BMW can't quite figure out what's happening with their car, whilst Williams have given up doing low fuel runs to grab headlines and are concentrating on gathering data instead.
